Ramón Casas Barcelona 1866-1932

Manuel de Muga, Barcelona
Purchased by the present owner from the above in 1995

The present work is a portrait of Casas' sister, who sat on a number of occasions for the artist. Wrapped in a distinctive yellow shawl (see lot 131) and sporting a long dress and train, Casas has placed her outdoors in an open landscape. The gamin good looks of her face and her elegantly coiffed hair are complimented by the rich textures of her formal attire.      

Together with Pere Romeu, Santiago Rusiñol and Miquel Utrillo, Ramón Casas was a founder member of El Quatre Gats in the Calle de Montsio, Barcelona. Tavern, beerhall, theatre and exhibition space, Els Quatre Gats provided the focal point for the left wing artists, writers, and intellectuals in Barcelona at the turn of the century. Inspired by the cabarets of Montmartre, such as Rodolphe de Salis' Le Chat Noir and Aristide Bruant's Le Mirliton, Els Quatre Gats was the cradle of Modernismo, the movement that sought to align the progressive attitudes of Catalán artists with the international events shaping the arts in Europe rather than those of Spain.

A pupil of the Spanish portraitist and history painter Joan Vicens, in 1883 Casas travelled to Paris to study with the French portraitist Carolus-Duran. A regular exhibitor in the Paris Salons, Casas also showed his work in the Sala Parés in Barcelona, organizing annual exhibitions there with Rusiñol from 1890-1930. An ardent self-publicist, as John Richardson explains, Casas became: 'the most renowned of the Modernista painters... He won over the more progressive elements in Barcelona with vast history paintings that are academic in style but liberal in sympathy; he delighted the bourgeosie with portraits that could be fashionable or informal as the sitter required; and he delighted the general public with the boldness of his posters and (later) the joie de vivre of his decorations for Els Quatre Gats' (John Richardson, A Life of Picasso, Volume I, 1881-1906, London, 1991, p. 115).